Crabs are not so popular in this household. Mum once spent a summer in the 1970s working in a crab processing factory. In those days, crab factories were legendarily horrible places to work. Everybody smoked and the cigarette ash got everywhere, including into the crab meat. And Mum and her associates were banned from every pub on the isles due to their stench. Lately, through some rehabilitation, she has begun to enjoy crab claws again, but she took some serious convincing to appreciate the brown meat from inside the shell.
This recipe is so simple because a fresh crab should only be so. It needs almost nothing with it. No mayonnaise. Definitely no pepper. Only bread, bannock or oatcake on which to serve the spreadable brown meat paste followed by a sprinkling of the flaked white meat from the legs and claws.
I don’t believe in asking your guests (or indeed, customers) to crack apart the claws and legs to obtain the meat. It may be a novelty but it’s a massive faff and done most efficiently in bulk, crab after crab. Factory-like.
The crab pictured was obtained from a creel down the road from our house and cooked within hours. Yes, he was boiled alive (see Susan’s Lobster Thermidor for an ethical discussion). He wasn’t alive for very long.
1 brown crab, alive
table salt, for the boiling water
Serve with:
white sourdough (or for best-quality sourdough)
Makes enough for an appetiser for 2–3 people
Bring 3–4 litres (6–8 pints) of water to the boil in a large pot. Add in a tablespoon of salt. You want a proper rolling boil. The more vigorous the boil, the faster the crab will be killed and the less the guilt you’ll feel. (You can ‘numb’ the crabs by placing them in a freezer beforehand, but if I was the crab I think I’d prefer a quick boil to a slow freeze.) Carefully lift the crab by the back of the shell and plunge into the boiling water. Stick a lid on and boil for 15 minutes, then remove the crab using tongs and transfer to a bowl of iced or very cold water.
Once cool, you should prepare a large chopping board or clean work surface and have plenty of kitchen paper or similar to mop up any of the fluid you spill. Start by placing your crab, back-down, onto the board and tear off all the legs and the claws. Set these aside.
Use your thumbs to pry the crab open – the apron (the bit with the legs attached) should easily lever out from the outer shell (carapace). It should take with it the dead man’s fingers, or the spongy bitter gills. Discard these.
In the carapace, you’ll have the mouth at the front, and behind it there’s a sac-like stomach. Get rid of this. Everything else in the shell is edible. Use a teaspoon to mix up all the brown meat into a paste and leave it in the shell.
The apron, despite looking like a solid mass of shell, is full of white meat – these were the most proximal and prominent muscles of your crab’s powerful legs. Scrape out all the tiny crevices, keeping the white meat together in a bowl. Avoid getting pieces of shell mixed in with the meat.
You don’t really need a nutcracker for crab – all the brown meat from the legs and claws can be obtained by dislocating each joint and prying each piece of the limbs apart. Poke the meat through with a knife or drag it out. Once you’ve got all the meat, serve it on a plate with the shell of brown meat. Enjoy spread onto slices of white sourdough.
